Many consumer products, such as flashlights, are specifically designed to be rugged and to withstand abuse. The durability of a product is often a major consideration for the consumer in deciding whether to purchase the product. The best test of durability available to a consumer at the point of sale is often his or her sense of touch. Thus, many consumers want to touch and feel the product before purchasing it.
Additionally, sales to consumers of many consumer products are based on aesthetic appeal. Consequently, a consumer often uses his senses, especially touch and feel to determine whether to purchase a product. A consumer is more apt to purchase a flashlight or other consumer products that he or she can touch.
Conventional packages for consumer goods are often transparent so that a consumer can see the product before he or she buys it. The transparency of the package, however, does nothing to make the product accessible to the consumer. Packages for consumer goods interfere with the consumer's sense of touch by completely enclosing the product. The consumer then has no way to make an independent assessment of the aesthetic feel or durability of the product other than by opening the package. And this is exactly what often happens: a consumer looks at the product, becomes interested in it and opens the package to touch it. The consumer abandons the product in favor of an unopened package of the same product or a package containing a different product. The opened package is never sold and is removed from the display area so as not to detract from the overall aesthetics of the display. The process of opening packaging is then repeated by other consumers so that more products and product displays are wasted. All consumers ultimately pay for the waste in higher prices.
The foregoing problem can be eliminated by allowing consumers to both see and touch the product at the point of sale. One way to allow consumers to touch the product is to sell the product unpackaged. An unpackaged product is typically displayed in a store in a display bin. The display bin, however, is an unacceptable solution for selling a low volume consumer product such as a flashlight, especially when surface blemishes, such as scratches, will prevent the sale of the product. A relatively expensive consumer product such as a flashlight is typically hung on a display rack for sale because display rack facilitates sales by making the product conspicuous and easily accessible to the consumer. Further, the display rack requires less valuable floor space in the store and does not require the store to first unpackage the product.
Another way is to sell a product such as a flashlight in a box that permits partial access to the flashlight. This type of package typically permits access to one or two sides of the flashlight. The consumer can thus tell what the flashlight feels like. The package, however, still obstructs the flashlight. A consumer cannot hold the flashlight in a normal operating position while it is in the package and is thus unable to discern its true "feel".
A need exists for a package for displaying a product such as a flashlight in a display rack in such a way that consumers have full access to the product while it remains securely held in its package.